


Rings of Roses

by signalbeam



Category: Persona 4
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Angst, Community: badbadbathhouse, Drama, Drama Llama, F/F, F/M, Friends are people who want you dead, M/M, Meta, Sibling Incest, Too many pairings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-07-19
Updated: 2009-07-19
Packaged: 2017-10-18 20:00:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/192694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/signalbeam/pseuds/signalbeam
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Utena series spoilers. Chie is the prince, Yukiko is the princess, and Souji is whoever you want him to bed. ... I mean, be.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rings of Roses

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the badbadbathhouse prompt: _Revolutionary Girl Utena/Persona 4 crossover._ What is this nonsense, I don't even.
> 
> An anon wrote an awesome Yosuke and Souji-centric Utena fusion set in this verse: [Cracking the Egg](http://badbadbathhouse.livejournal.com/1225.html?thread=5376969#t5376969). fff so flattered. .__.

Chie wakes up with her ring cutting against her skin and the imprint of a rose on her cheek. She has been dreaming, dreaming of a coffin and a church and a prince hugging her to his chest.

“One day, this ring will lead you to me.”

The voice is soft in her memory’s ear.

 

\---

 

“Haven’t you ever thought it was weird?” Chie asks. Naoto is scrawling notes in her book, looking faintly disdainful of the math. “I mean, the forest and the… whole creepy floating castle and the dueling in the sky thing, the music—”

“Really,” Naoto says. “Senpai, perhaps you would do better in math if you applied your thinking to your classes, instead.”

“Or how we always draw the Sword of Dios with our left hands, instead of our right—and how it’s always so dramatically windy up there, and—”

“Chie-sama,” Yukiko says. “Would you like some tea?”

“Don’t call me that,” Chie says.

“Of course, Chie-sama,” says Yukiko smoothly, and fills up a cup for Chie. “Whatever you say.”

 

\---

 

Chie’s sure she’s asked this question each time she’s fought with one of the student council members: “Why are you fighting?”

“Because my Ma’s dying,” says Kanji. “Because I need a miracle.”

“For truth,” says Naoto. “To find the truth that never changes.”

“To become the best,” says Kou. “To become something everyone will remember.”

“Because it amuses me,” says Yosuke. “Because I love you.”

Well, she knows that Yosuke’s a liar, anyway.

When she asks Yukiko why she’s the Rose Bride, all she gets is an enigmatic, “Because I am the Rose Bride.”

“Yes, but why?” Chie presses.

“Because I am the Rose Bride.”

“But you had to be something else at one point—”

“You were born Chie Satonaka-sama,” says Yukiko. “I was born as the Rose Bride.”

“You’re Yukiko Amagi,” Chie insists. “You don’t have to be the Rose Bride. You have friends and family and…”

“I don’t need any of those.” She picks up her weird mouse-bear-monkey and says, “I do have a friend. Right here.” The mute bear waves at her. Chie feeds him a cracker.

“Am I your friend?” Chie asks, watching the cracker disappear into the bear’s mouth.

Yukiko smiles at her. “If that’s what you want.”

 

\---

 

“Did you just turn into a car?”

“Chie-sama saw nothing,” says Yukiko.

“But I—”

“You saw nothing,” she says, and Chie almost believes her.

“But—”

“Yes, Chie-sama?”

“… Never mind.”

 

\---

 

“So you’re Yukiko’s big brother,” says Chie. The telescope looms behind her, a silent witness.

Souji’s smile is honest and sly. “You might not think it at first, but yes. I’m Souji Kujikawa, acting chairman of the Kujikawa Academy. And you must be Satonaka-kun.” When he takes her hand, Chie feels a thrill shoot up her spine. Maybe because his skin is cooler than hers. “Stay for some tea, won’t you? It would be my honor.”

Yukiko smiles at the both of them vaguely and says, “I’ll go make it.”

He’s been holding onto Chie’s hand since the conversation started, and hasn’t let go. A girl, her brown hair falling about her shoulder, steps in and smiles pleasantly. Chie jerks her hand away from Souji, blushing madly.

“Hello,” says the newcomer. “You are?”

“Chie Satonaka,” Chie says quickly. “Good to meet you. You are…?”

“This is my fiancée,” Souji says, and kisses her neck. “Rise Kujikawa.”

 

\---

 

“Hello?” The hall is empty, save for the chairs lining the lobby. There’s an open door at the end of the hall. She steps through.

“… I have an appointment today. Rise Kujikawa. High school. First year, class four. I… I heard that you talk to people you think need some help. Um… I don’t really need it. I mean, my career’s doing fine, and Souji-kun is a wonderful man. He… he’s everything that I want in a man. I can’t wait to marry him. But…”

“Go on.”

The elevator moves upwards.

“He has this sister. Yukiko Amagi. She’s… she’s so creepy. It’s like she’s a doll. I try to get along with her, but she always looks down on me. I asked her to take a picture with me, and she refused! I try to love her, but I can’t! I can’t love her! And the more I try, the more Souji laughs at me. H-he says I’m just being paranoid, but—but…”

“Deeper… deeper…”

“This… this relationship would be perfect if she weren’t there! Yes, that’s right—if she weren’t there, if Yukiko weren’t there, if I could make her go away—if I could make her go away!”

The elevator stops. The door opens. A man is standing there, framed against the glowing lights of a giant furnace. “I understand,” he says. “Your only choice is to revolutionize the world. The path you must take has been prepared for you. Come…”

 

\---

 

The desks are organized in rows, with a camera on each desk.

Rise draws her sword.

“Upon the Black Rose, I swear that I will win this duel and kill the Rose Bride,” she says. Her sword glints in the sun.

 

\---

 

“If the egg’s shell does not break, the chick will die without being born. We are the chick; the world is our egg. If the world’s shell does not break, we will die without being born. Break the world’s shell! For the sake of revolutionizing—”

“Sit down, Yosuke,” Naoto says. “You’re embarrassing me.”

 

\---

 

“Is anyone here?” Saki asks.

The signs all point to a door at the end of the hall. She steps through.

The elevator moves up.

“Sorry,” she says. “I didn’t know you were already in…”

“Your name?”

“Saki Konishi. High school. Third year, class three.”

“… Go on.”

“I’ve heard rumors about this place. That you can talk to someone, when things aren’t working out. There… there’s this boy who I work for. I hate him. He walks around like he’s some kind of hot shot, and he keeps trying to hit on me. It’s like he doesn’t know when to say no. But I keep him around, right? Because it’s nice to have someone look up to you.”

“… Go on.”

“You know… just the other day. I saw him talking with that Amagi girl. The one with the creepy smile and those glasses. And the way he looked at her made me so… angry. I’m sure she’ll break his heart. She does that to everyone: takes them in and spits them out again. And when she does that to him…”

The elevator shakes.

“Deeper,” whispers the voice on the other side. “Go deeper.”

“And when she does that to him… I’ll be there. I’ll be there to pick him up… and when he’s all better, I’ll tell him what I really think of him. That he’s ruined my life, just by coming to this school! That I want him dead, for ever coming into my life! That’s why… that’s why I want him to fall in love with her! That’s why I want him to fall in love with her, so he forgets all about me until I can have him for myself! Then I can break him—break him in the same way that he broke my life!”

The elevator came to a stop.

“I understand. Your only choice is to revolutionize the world. The path you must take has been prepared for you. Come…”

 

\---

 

Saki Konishi falls to the ground. The black rose petals rise like a storm around her body.

“What _was_ that?” Chie asks no one in particular. She looks out to the bell tower, in hopes of spotting one of the student council members—Naoto, Yosuke, Kanji, Kou, anyone—but sees nothing out there except shadow.

 

\---

 

“How long to you have?” Adachi asks into the dark.

“You shouldn’t talk like that, Adachi,” the girl says. “We still have time.”

“You’re sick.”

“I can get better.”

“I’ll make you my Bride,” he promises. “I can save you.”

Nanako hands him a black rose and tells him, “Go.”

 

\---

 

“Be careful,” Yosuke warns Naoto. “These Black Rose duelists have been getting out of hand. They even got me.”

“Perhaps that’s a statement of your inability as president of our council,” Naoto says coolly. Then, softening, she says, “I’ll be fine, Yosuke.”

 

\---

 

“Excuse me,” Naoto says, and seats herself on the chair. “I’ve come here to investigate this elevator on the behalf of the student council.”

“Your name.”

“Naoto Shirogane. High school. First year, class one.” She crisply adjusts her uniform. “I’ve been told that the Saki Konishi was last seen in this place before she was found—elsewhere.”

“Would you like to talk?”

“Very much, yes.”

“Come back later.”

“But I would like to talk now.”

“You are the secretary of the student council.”

“That is correct, but I do not see what that has to do with this investigation.”

“If you are the secretary of the student council, then why do people call you ‘Detective’?”

“That is—”

The elevator moves up. Adachi’s eyes are yellow beyond the screen.

“Tell me.”

 

\---

 

This time, little trinkets cover the desks: a badge, a flashlight. A picture of a smiling old man, the top half of the photo that shows his face torn off.

“Naoto-kun?” Chie asks, confused. “Why are you—”

“Upon the Black Rose… I swear that I shall win this duel,” Naoto says dully. “And then… I shall kill the Rose Bride.”

“Naoto-kun, this doesn’t have to come down to this—”

“With my grandfather’s sword, I shall end this,” Naoto says, drawing her sword. “Draw your sword, Engaged. For the sake of my name as a detective, I shall kill the Rose Bride.”

When Chie looks behind her, Yukiko is holding a picture of Souji, cut down the middle. Chie has long given up on trying to understand what happens up here, but catches Yukiko when she falls, and draws the sword from Yukiko’s breast.

“I don’t understand,” Chie says. “Why?”

“Yes, that would be a problem for you, wouldn’t it,” Naoto says. “Being able to understand… being able to comprehend.” Her sword flashes in the light of the castle. “Do not concern yourself too much, senpai. With this sword, I shall kill my grandfather… and rightfully inherit the title that belongs to me.”

 

\---

 

“I don’t get it,” Chie says, watching as Naoto and her grandfather walk around the school grounds while Yukiko waters the roses. “Just yesterday she was saying how much she hated him—”

“Hating someone and loving someone is not mutually exclusive, Chie-sama,” Yukiko says.

“Yeah, but—”

“When you love someone enough, you swallow the hate down and pretend it’s not there.”

“Wouldn’t it be healthier to acknowledge those feelings and accept them…?” On the other side of the greenhouse, Yosuke is kissing the glass. She ignores him.

“If that’s what you prefer, Chie-sama.”

“But—all of those feelings, they have to come bubbling out sometime, right?” Chie asks.

Yukiko’s glasses catch the sun’s glare as she turns her head away from Chie. “Oh, yes, Chie-sama. They do come out in ways you don’t quite expect.”

 

\---

Chie doesn’t know Naoki Konishi, either, except that he’s the brother of Saki Konishi, and that he is (was?) Kanji’s friend. Probably still is, because if there’s one thing the Black Rose duelists have proven to her, it’s that denial overwhelms all other emotion.

Chie wonders if there will be a Black Rose duelist coming after for her, too.

 

\---

“Name’s Daisuke,” says the transfer student. “I’m an old friend of Kou’s.”

“He doesn’t seem to like you very much,” Chie observes.

“The two of us used to be the best of friends,” he says. He isn’t as cute as Kou, but he has a rugged charm to him nonetheless. “Don’t know what happened to him. Got all cold to me. Probably something to do about that dumb Ichijo family name thing.”

“Oh, really,” Chie says. Her heart goes out to him. Kou’s nice and friendly on most days, but sometimes—sometimes, he can be a little too cold.

“Wonder what the hell happened to him,” Daisuke says softly. “Really.”

 

\---

 

“Name?”

“Daisuke Nagase. High school. Second year, class four. Got this friend named Kou. Tricky little bastard, he is. All the while avoiding me and pretending to be my friend, when he’s been looking at me all this time—”

“Go on.”

“I’ve never really been his friend. He made me feel like I was special, but that’s not a reason to be friends. Compared to him, I was no one. I was the captain of the soccer team, he was the captain of the basketball team, but he always got more attention. Why, goddamn it?! Why him?!”

The locket is open in his hands.

“But I got something on him now. All this time when I thought he was ignoring me—I got something that proves it otherwise. But that’s sick, isn’t it? Just plain sick—how long has he been looking at me like that? That’s sick… how could he be looking at me like that? That’s just—I just want him to be…”

The elevator stops. The locket falls onto the floor.

“Goddamn it! Why? What the hell did I do wrong?! Why won’t he talk to me?!” he screams, and grips his head in his hands.

Adachi steps beyond the screen.

“… Go,” he says. Daisuke looks up at him, breathing hard, eyes wide. “That is why… you do not belong here.”

 

\---

 

“For example,” Souji says, “nobility is not a good determination of goodness.”

“Aah,” Chie says. And then she says, “I don’t get it.”

“Being a prince requires a… nobility of the spirit,” Souji says. “I see it in you often enough, Satonaka-kun. But just because one has nobility of spirit doesn’t mean that you are a good person. After all, even villains can have good hearts.” His eyes linger on Yukiko, sitting on the far end of the couch with a blank look in her eyes. “Even princes,” he whispers, “can be ruined.”

 

\---

 

“I like her,” Souji says.

“Yes, big brother.”

“Don’t you?”

“Yes, big brother.”

“Why don’t you buy some roses for her?”

“Red or black?”

“Red, of course. What kind of man do you think I am?”

 

\---

 

Chie’s never even seen Ai Ebihara before, but fighting Ai as she screams out Kou’s name makes Chie feel too much like an intruder, like she’s walking in on something she shouldn’t have seen. It’s Kou who takes Ai back, Kou who holds her and whispers things into her ear while Daisuke watches, then helps Kou take her back.

“Kou-sama is very kind,” Yukiko comments, in that detached way of hers.

“Were you ever engaged to him?”

“I’ve been engaged to many people.”

“But—”

“Let me go make you some shaved ice, Chie-sama.”

“I’m your friend, aren’t I?”

“I’ll make it strawberry flavored this time.”

 

\---

 

Adachi worked for a man called Dojima once.

It’s hard for him to remember what Dojima was like. A hard, gruff man with a young daughter. He remembered—he remembered that he wanted the girl to live, if only for Dojima’s sake. But when Dojima died, only Adachi was there to look over Nanako.

 _No,_ says Souji. _Look harder. Deeper._

It’s hard for him to remember what Dojima was like. A hard, gruff man with a young daughter. Dojima never smoked in front of her—

 _No,_ says Nanako. _Look harder. Deeper._

Dojima was a hard, gruff man with a young daughter. They had been researching the Academy, to find the source of “miracles.” Maybe if they could cure Nanako, then Adachi could tell Dojima about how he really felt—

But Dojima already had someone. He already had someone, someone with shining silver eyes and dark hair. Someone who could make Dojima cry out in pleasure, writhe in his hands—

_One hundred students died in this building. They never found out who the culprit was._

He needs to save Nanako. For Dojima-san’s sake. And if the only way to make Nanako the Rose Bride is to defeat Dojima-san—poor gullible, guileless, hapless Dojima-san, who fell in love with that monster, Souji-kun—then so be it.

“Dojima-san,” he says. “Duel with me.”

The ring is black on his finger. If he looks hard enough, then it’s not Dojima-san standing next to him, but a girl with short brown hair and a dark uniform. But when he looks again, it’s Dojima-san again, a sword at his hip and a memory on his smile.

“That’s not my name,” says Dojima. “Who are you talking to?”

“I’ll meet you at the Dueling Arena at sunset.”

“Who are you?” Dojima asks. His voice echoes. There’s a woman speaking over him. Satonaka is standing where Dojima once did. Then it’s Dojima again.

Madness. The world has gone mad.

 

\---

 

“Poor man,” Souji says, staring up at the false stars. His sister sits on the couch, her legs crossed, hands in her lap. “I don’t think he’ll ever find the truth. Don’t you think so, Nanako?”

“Yes, big brother.” But it isn’t Nanako who answers.

“Don’t you love these stars?” he says. “They shine so brightly.” He looks down at Yukiko, openly admiring her naked body, the way her hair falls when she lets it down, the coolness in her eyes when she does not wear her glasses. “Look at the stars with me, Yukiko.”

“I’ve seen them all before,” she says. She stares straight ahead, her eyes fixed on nothing in particular. “I’ve seen everything from these heights.”

 

\---

 

This isn’t right. Souji is, after all, Yukiko’s big brother. He’s engaged. Rise is a wonderful girl. They really deserve some privacy and family time.

“This is really too much,” Chie says. “I mean, we could’ve gone to live in the regular dorms, I don’t have to move up here—”

“My big brother insists on it,” she says. “It’s no trouble. He wants you here.”

“I feel like an intruder, though,” she says with a laugh. “Well… if you insist.”

 

\---

 

This isn’t right. Souji is, after all, Yukiko’s big brother. He’s engaged. Rise is a wonderful girl. And it’s not like her to be so taken by him like this. Souji isn’t Chie's prince. Or maybe he is. He might be… he might be her prince. When she sees him, her heart always feels as though it might explode. When she slips and falls during a game of basketball, it’s Yukiko who helps her walk through the school.

“Are you really okay, Chie-sama?” Yukiko asks. “We should take you to the infirmary… oh!” Souji drives up in his car. The car is bright red. Yukiko’s choice, maybe? Chie’s never seen Souji in anything except crisp blacks and whites. “Elder brother, Chie-sama is hurt!”

Souji takes one look at Chie and smiles.

 

\---

 

This isn’t right.

Souji is, after all, Yukiko’s big brother. He’s engaged. Rise is a wonderful girl. And it’s not like her to be so taken by him like this. After all, she’s saving herself for her prince, but maybe it’s okay if Souji is a prince, but not _her_ prince. After all, Souji has Yukiko. Souji is Yukiko’s prince, just like Chie is.

“Are there people that you love… without meaning to?” Chie asks when they’re in bed. “Oh… no, that was a weird question, wasn’t it?”

“A little bit, Chie-sama.”

“Thanks.”

“Of course… I don't think that there's any such thing as loving incorrectly," Yukiko says. "But there are people you should not fall in love with and people you should never have loved and people who change until you cannot love them. Even so…”

Chie wonders what Yukiko would have said if she let herself finish. And then she wonders if Yukiko is talking about her. Souji is, after all, Yukiko's brother--

“Do you have anyone you like?” Chie asks, desperate to deflect attention away from her.

“Oh, yes,” Yukiko says. Her hand is warm in Chie’s. “I have a prince of my own.”

 

\---

 

This isn’t right. Souji is, after all, Yukiko’s big brother. He’s engaged. Rise is a wonderful girl. And it’s not like her to be so taken by him like this. He’s an adult. She is not.

The Ferris wheel dips into the horizon, and does not come back.

“There’s nothing really special about becoming an adult,” says Souji, his arm casually draped along the back of Chie’s seat.

“Really?”

“I can make you one.”

The car purrs. His hand is on her shoulder, stroking hair away from her face.

 

\---

 

This isn’t right. Souji is, after all, Yukiko’s big brother. He’s engaged. Rise is a wonderful girl. She thinks this is-it's. It's...

“L-lunch,” she says. “I should think about lunch… I mean, normally I get it from the cafeteria, but Yukiko’s cooking hasn’t been so bad…”

She gasps, a little.

“A-anyway, I’m sure it’s getting better, and… and…”

He strokes her face. “Are you comfortable?”

“I… I don’t know.”

He’s smiling. He’s gentle.

 

\---

 

This isn’t right. Souji is, after all, Yukiko’s big brother. Yukiko is Souji’s little sister. He's engaged. They're _related_.

Yukiko’s hair is long and black. Souji’s hand creeps up her thigh, then vanishes between them. They’re kissing. The noise of their lips together breaks away into a moan. Maybe they don’t even notice her—or maybe they do. Souji crawls on top of Yukiko and his hips pull back and she’s been standing here for too long.

 

\---

 

The stars are fake. At the top of the dueling arena, there is only darkness awaiting: darkness and Souji in a white uniform and a cape that billows out dramatically behind him and a tall mirror.

“You are no prince,” he says. “You abandoned my sister when you learned her true nature. You were seduced into my bed so easily, like a common school girl. When you are saving people, it is only out of your own desire to be seen as a prince.”

Chie flinches, but she’s prepared for this. She said the same things herself, just the night before, when she woke and found Yukiko at the roof of the building, ready to fall off the edge. Her nobility is not unshatterable or unshakeable. But she is a prince. She _is_ a prince.

“Look at yourself,” says Souji, and Chie looks down at herself in shock. She is wearing… a dress. Green and flowing. The dress of the Rose Bride. He steps to her, and takes her hand. “Throw down your sword. You're no prince. You were only someone for me to save.”

 

\---

 

Fairy tales aren't supposed to end like this. Stories of princes and princesses don't end with someone crawling towards a mirror, trying to sink through it, trying to open the path to Dios and the true power of the self.

Chie's never been so far from victory as she is now, with her fingers pressed against the glass, and all she can think is, _please, please let me in_.

She doesn't expect the mirror to yield, but it does, in little fits and bursts, until it leads her to a new world.


End file.
